Some of these teams were inherited and nothing points to the heirs having an ability to make a billion elsewhere. See our Texans. See the Buss kids. Etc
GM LeBron has recruited multiple great players to join him and has 9 Finals trips and 4 titles on his resume (I didn’t count his 1st Finals), and folks in here calling Morey great cuz he made a few WCF’s.
I don’t mind players requesting a trade. What I don’t like is what players do to force a trade. Half-assing it on the court is unacceptable. I would rather a player just refuse to come to work than to betray his teammates and fans by not giving full effort on the court. It’s almost like the NBA has a transfer portal.
I wonder what it would be like if the NBA had no guaranteed contracts--in either direction. Or maybe only guaranteed (in both directions) for the season, to prevent the chaos of players becoming free agents mid-season. So every player is a free agent every year. You lose the long-term albatrosses but also the long-term bargains. The only trades would be in-season trades for rest-of-season help. But you also don't have the "stars demanding out when they're under contract for years" situation that some people seem to hate, since there would be no years-long contracts. Notably, I guess that would have really hurt Golden State, as Curry being on a 4-year deal that severely underpaid him (due to health issues that immediately went away) wouldn't have bound him to that salary once he blew up.
Some of them yes. Most of them no. And those silverspoon owners probably inherited other means besides the basketball team.
You'd lose all your fans. Fans root for players they love watching develop and grow - that's what creates bonds between teams and their fans. There would also be no incentive for teams to develop players, nor would there be any incentive for players on mediocre teams to be anything other than selfish. You'd lose any sense of cohension or complexity in offense since you could never rely on players learning it long-term. Teams like the Warriors and Spurs that played team basketball would be worthless. That said, the NBA needs to re-evaluate their entire system. The salary cap is way too convoluted with too many loopholes. This whole idea that overpaid guys in the last year of their contracts are attractive assets is ridiculous. I'm not sure the solution, but things need to somehow be re-evaluated to make some logical sense.
To me, the whole idea of trading contracts rather than players (e.g. getting players you immediately waive, salary dump trades, etc.) is counter the spirit of trading.
Exactly - no one should be wanting players they can pay to not play or waive or whatever. I don't know if the teams are OK with it or not, but it seems like the NBA needs to figure out a way to change their system around. No other sport seems to have this issue.
No other sport is so dependent on individual players, in the NBA one player can change your franchise completely and the rosters are much smaller, which makes them so valuable. NBA players just hold so much more leverage than other athletes.
Sure - but in this context about the structural issues, I'm talking about the crappy players/contracts that actually are considered positive assets for things besides their performance on the court. Joe Engels, for example, was traded last season in the last year of his contract despite having a season-ending injury because Portland found value in trading for his dead contract. That shouldn't happen in a well-designed system
The NBA is most definitely a players driven league as opposed to the NFL for sure. As one of the old guys on this forum it makes me laugh when I hear KD talking about how I will only go play for the Heat if Jimmy, Bam, and Lowry are not part of any trades. That just blows my mind. I know I have said this before but what ever happened to just playing basketball. Teams reserve the right to trade you to whomever makes the best offer. It should always be about the franchise, not individual players. I get that prime LeBron was a great recruiter and if veteran players wanna take less to go play with their friends then go for it but don’t blame GMs and owners for trying to do what’s best for their franchise. When great players move on the fans are left and hopefully the owner and GM have the team in a good position to be good again sooner rather than later. Watching my Rockets has been tough the past few years and probably another few before it will be good again.
The NBA is entering another round of collective bargaining talks, which could involve discussions of how the player empowerment era has impacted teams and players. But what could be a more likely scenario than rule changes is the ownership side changing how they conduct their business and how much power they're willing to freely give to players. The Brooklyn Nets gave Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving tremendous power when they signed with the franchise in 2019, but that power was largely revoked this offseason. Other franchises may be following suit. "There is the beginning of push back by teams," said Brian Windhorst on ESPN Daily. "Definitely in Brooklyn. Definitely in Utah. And they are going to be out stars because of it. And we are heading to a collective bargaining negotiation that's going to take place over the summer. There's been an assumption that the owners are going to push for massive changes; I haven't heard that from any of the actual people on the ownership side. "We do have Adam Silver on record saying players have to honor their contracts. And we do see two organizations shoving back on their stars, potentially to the detriment to their championship hopes. "And we're monitoring the Lakers. We're monitoring the Lakers." "Brian, what you're telling me is something is happening in Los Angeles," replied Pablo Torre. Windhorst goes on to allude to how LeBron James is pushing for the Lakers to trade for Kyrie Irving, and there could be consequences should a deal not be executed. "Definitely Brooklyn, definitely Utah, and we have the L.A. Lakers on the watch list for pushing back on players guiding so much of what's going on," said Windhorst.
There are some big time player stans in this thread. Maybe time to get off the internet for 10 mins and take a break from screaming racist at everything that breathes.
